Quebec City, Canada, Nov 4, 2013 / 12:20 pm
The province of Quebec is moving towards a "closed secularism" that will harm the ability to teach Catholicism in high schools, says a principal leading a legal challenge against regulations of religion classes.
Paul Donovan, principal of Montreal's Loyola High School, said he has no problem promoting pluralism in a province-mandated religion and ethics class, but he objects to provincial rules that bar explanations for religious belief.
"We just want to teach it from a Catholic point of view," he told Canada's National Post. "Quebec wants us to keep any explanation out of why people believe what they believe. You are supposed to say this is what they believe and that's it."
"The government requires that when you're dealing with other religions that the teacher in the classroom completely disassociates himself from any religious perspective or religious value. So we can never say, 'As Catholics, we see this…'"